In October 2023, the California Department of Education released test scores for all students in Grades 3-8 and 11 for the 2022-23 school year. These results represent an opportunity to analyze whether and to what extent student learning has rebounded after the dramatic declines in scores resulting from the COVID-19 pandemic and related school…

This study finds that, breaking with decades of slow improvement, U.S. reading and math scores on the National Assessment of Educational Progress (NAEP) and other assessments have seen historic declines since most states implemented national Common Core English and math curriculum standards six years ago. This descriptive analysis is designed to…

This report features components of California's plan under the Every Student Succeeds Act that impact the 1.3 million English learners in the state regarding testing, accountability, and stakeholder engagement. Advocates can use this information to engage administrators and policymakers around improving outcomes for English learners and ensuring…

Purpose: The purpose of this quantitative, experimental study was to determine if there was a significant difference in 2016 Smarter Balanced Assessment (SBA) English language arts (ELA) writing levels and ELA overall achievement levels between 7th- and 8th-grade students with and without access to Chromebooks for at least one 46-minute period of…

Despite increases in overall academic achievement, African American males continue to struggle in the area of mathematics. Data from the National Assessment of Educational Progress (NAEP) indicates that eighth grade African American males had the lowest levels of mathematics success of all subgroups in 2013, with only 13% performing at or above…

California has the largest share of the English Language Learner (ELL) student population in the U.S., and it continues to grow. English Language Learners are the fastest growing group in the public school population and they are underachieving. The purpose of this study was to evaluate the longitudinal changes in the performance of English…

Although researchers call for inquiry learning in science, science assessments rarely capture the impact of inquiry instruction. This paper reports on the development and validation of assessments designed to measure middle-school students' progress in gaining integrated understanding of energy while studying an inquiry-oriented curriculum. The…

California, Florida, Illinois, New York, and Texas enroll close to 40 percent of the nation's public school students. The importance of these "Mega-States" goes beyond the sheer size of their population. They now serve more than half of the nation's English language learners (ELL), as well as some of the largest concentrations of…

NAEP Trial Urban District Assessment (TUDA) results in mathematics and reading are based on representative samples of 1,100 to 2,300 public school students at grade 4 and 900 to 2,100 public school students at grade 8 in each participating urban district in 2013. Twenty-one urban districts participated in the 2013 assessments. The assessments…

The National Assessment of Educational Progress (NAEP), in partnership with the National Assessment Governing Board and the Council of the Great City Schools (CGCS), created the Trial Urban District Assessment (TUDA) in 2002 to support the improvement of student achievement in the nation's large urban districts. The TUDA focuses attention on urban…

This paper profiles California's test score trends through 2008-09. Between 2005 and 2009, the percentages of students reaching the proficient level on the state test and the basic level on NAEP (National Assessment of Educational Progress) increased in grades 4 and 8 in both reading and math. Average annual gains were larger on the state test…

Focusing on student proficiency in reading and math from 2003-04 to 2006-07, this report compares gaps in performance on state achievement tests between grade 8 American Indian and Alaska Native students and all other grade 8 students in 26 states serving large populations of American Indian and Alaska Native students. In response to a request by…

The overall aim of this article is to analyze the relationships between the roles of assessment in pedagogy, the interactions between curriculum assessment and pedagogy, and the study of pupils' progression in learning. It is argued that well-grounded evidence of pupils' progressions in learning is crucial to the work of teachers, so that a method…

In this study, the authors examined the academic performance of 18 urban districts that participated in the 2009 Trial Urban District Assessment (TUDA) of the National Assessment of Education Progress (NAEP). The districts participated in grade 4 and grade 8 reading and mathematics assessments. Eleven of these districts also participated in the…

Each state and jurisdiction that participated in the National Assessment of Educational Progress (NAEP) 2011 reading assessment receives a one-page snapshot report that presents key findings and trends in a condensed format. Overall results, achievement level percentages and average score results, comparison of the average score in 2011 to other…